Scrolling through his colorful YouTube recommended page — lined with Mike Powell, Mattia Furlani and track and field jumping thumbnails — senior and track and field jumper Ryan Shen runs through his pre-meet ritual. Shen curates an inspirational media diet, treating it as seriously as his actual diet, since both affect his performance. By monitoring how much he eats, Shen aims to avoid extra food that could weigh him down and prevent him from breaking new personal and school records. For Shen, his events are a game of inches. All of his work has earned him a Division III commitment to Carnegie Mellon University, where he will begin this fall.
According to Shen’s mom, Shirley Wang, Shen has taken his passions to the next level since his early childhood. When basketball was a main focus for Shen in elementary school, he would take initiative and practice shooting at Lincoln Elementary School in his free time. Shen’s determination carries through to the present day, where he has put in countless hours behind the scenes to achieve success in track and field for long jump, triple jump and high jump, according to Wang.
“After he started getting really serious about track, every weekend we went to a meet,” Wang said. “We surrendered a lot of family time, but we always wanted to go see him. He had to miss a lot more school events, like prom, so he had to make a lot of sacrifices.”
Although Shen has always been self-driven, track and field wasn’t always on his radar. In his eighth-grade P.E. class, Shen was told by his P.E. teacher, Andrew Murray, that he had the perfect body type for jumping. Shen then continued working on his jumps to crosstrain for basketball.
With a physical advantage at his starting point, Shen knew he could reach high targets— but only with the mental persistence and hunger to do so. Track and Field Head Coach David Sciplin has spent significant time guiding Shen through his mental game over the years, even more than his physical strategy. Sciplin strongly believes that success depends on the athlete’s motivation and the effort they put in to reach a collegiate level of sports.
“There’s a mentality that you have to have, there has to be a drive to want to win,” Sciplin said. “You have to want to be your absolute best. Usually, athletes who have the ability to play at a collegiate level have that. Ryan has that same desire.”
While Shen was cut out for jumps between his mental devotion and physical prowess, he still pushed himself to the max, even with no one watching. During the summer between his sophomore and junior year, Shen would train three times a week with a private coach. In addition, he would follow an external training schedule his coach provided him with, focused on lifting — specifically, explosive power in his legs — about five training sessions a week. Even with school, Shen found a way to keep his improvement trending upward consistently.
“During the school year, I’d continue the training as much as I could,” Shen said. “But when I got to basketball season, I could only fit in weight training twice a week, and I didn’t have time to make it out to the track. Basketball season actually helped me improve my track and field season too, because of all the running and jumping, which heavily carried over to my events.”
Implementing this training led Shen to see results, which fueled his drive to become a collegiate athlete. During a rapid period of physical and mental growth in his junior year, Shen saw the Saint Francis High School Invitational meet as a turning point, realizing he had a clear chance to compete at the collegiate level. Shen has broken many records in the track meets he’s competed in over the course of his athletic career, though his main focus has always been improving himself, rather than comparing his accomplishments to others.
“I’ve broken my own record, which is also the school record, three or four times now,” Shen said. “I’ve broken the triple jump record and the long jump record, which I keep improving on. I’m at 24 feet, 4 inches right now, so hopefully I keep that trend going.”
After all the progress Shen has made, Wang is extremely proud of his efforts. Wang believes that although Shen is naturally gifted athletically, it does not outweigh the hours of training his body and mind have endured, especially in difficult moments. According to Wang, Shen received D1 offers, but still chose a path that would be more balanced for him. Shen wanted an academic career to pair with his athletic one, and CMU offered a good balance, as he plans to major in electrical and computer engineering.
“I am pretty proud of him for not being swayed by other people’s opinions or views,” Wang said. “He had so many opportunities, but he really sat down and thought about his decision. He was able to ultimately do what he thought was best for him and found a balance that he wanted.”
As Shen’s last high school season comes to a close, he says he will miss it a lot. Unready to move on from his teammates, he will mainly miss the unique experience of being in high school track and field and competing in big meets, like CIF State Championships, Stanford Invitational, Arcadia Invitational and more. With the bittersweetness of leaving high school athletics, Shen looks forward to a bright future with big goals.
“A large goal of mine would be the Olympics,” Shen said. “It’s a hard goal to obtain, but right now, I am in the top three in Division III for my event. Next year, I’ll try to get the number one spot and maybe move up to Division I.”
Among the drive and goals that Shen has had and achieved throughout his journey, it is his genuine passion that enables him to shine and reach the next level at his events. Having interacted with every athlete in MVHS’ track and field program, Sciplin says he sees Shen’s undeniably genuine love for the sport.
“Most of all, he really just has fun doing this,” Sciplin said. “He’s supportive of others, no matter what their abilities are. At practice, he helps others, and at meets, he is serious about how he jumps, but he’s also able to relate to everyone else. It’s been a fun atmosphere to be around him and watch him keep progressing and getting better over the course of his high school career.”
